The Burning City (13 page)

“I know him.” She stared at his bloody, sagging face. “I know who this guy is. Who this vampire is, I should say.”

“What?”

For you, darling.

“This is the vampire who shot me. The one who shot Rose.”

She motioned for Sam to give her the flashlight. She passed the light down his body. Blood, so much blood. A ragged hole in his chest, the edges pulpy and glistening. She stepped closer, and her toes squished in the bloody grass. She jerked back.

“Are you serious?” Sam said. “Is this supposed to be a dead bird on the doorstep to get your attention?”

“I’m guessing.”

The vampire was clutching something in his left hand. A Polaroid picture.

Voices came from down the driveway. Footsteps.

She knelt and snatched the picture out of his bloody fingers. She stuffed it into her back pocket, and she and Sam moved away from the body, June still shining the light on him.

“Over here!” Sam yelled, waving.

“This was definitely a message,” June said lowly.

“He knows where you are, and he isn’t afraid to visit. Wonderful.”

Two guards rushed over, one talking on a radio.

“It’s a vampire,” Sam said. “We’re pretty sure, anyway.”

“Do you know how he got on the property?” the other guard asked Sam.

“I was about to ask you the same thing.” Sam glared.

Commotion ensued. Cop cars and an ambulance arrived in a short time, and everyone present was questioned. June watched as they removed the body. She didn’t pull the picture out of her pocket, afraid someone might take it from her.

She didn’t tell the police about Occam. She simply told them she’d been outside, heard a sound, went to investigate, and found the body. She couldn’t say anything about the vampire, either, because it was part of the federal case and she wasn’t allowed to talk about being shot or Rose’s death.

“Are there any security cameras?” a tall black policeman asked them.

“They’re not operational.” Sam sighed. “I just got my house back. We’re lucky to have electric. The security company is supposed to come out tomorrow.”

“Do you have any idea who might have done this?” The cop wrote in a notepad. “Although, I’m sure you have plenty of enemies right now, Mr. Haain.”

Sam stiffened. “Yes, I do. I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if this was the work of Robbie Beecher. Shouldn’t you be out trying to find him?”

“He’d definitely rip a guy’s heart out,” June said. Attributing this to Robbie was probably a good idea. It would keep the police from sniffing around and finding out about the kidnapping.

“I would like a police detail here tonight,” Sam said. “Since clearly government employees are useless.”

“We’ll be patrolling the neighborhood.” The cop snapped the notebook shut. “But we’re not private security, Mr. Haain. You have to pay for that.”

Sam glowered. “Can I count on your vote, at least?”

The cop walked away.

“You better send them home.” June indicated Sam’s friends, huddled together in the driveway. “Is it possible you could get them to not tell everyone they know about what happened here tonight? At least not yet? Let’s not give Occam an edge.”

“I’ll swear them to silence.”

Sam talked to his friends. The police were making a sweep of the property.

She slipped inside.

She blinked in the light, her eyes adjusting. The house was quiet. She didn’t know if Anthony had left. Maybe he was still curled up in a ball in the sunroom. She hurried to the kitchen where no one would see her and pulled the picture out of her pocket.

She drew a sharp breath, tears springing to her eyes.

Jason and Diego. Alive. Not looking happy, but alive.

They were disheveled, their clothes dirty, Jason’s hair sticking up. Occam probably didn’t remember what a shower was, as bad as he smelled. They were both glowering at the camera, but they didn’t appear sickly or wounded, just unkempt.

She pressed the picture to her chest, her hands trembling. Tears spilled down her cheeks.

“Thank you,” she whispered. “A really fucking dramatic way to deliver your message, but thanks.”

Sam entered the kitchen behind her. She turned.

“What is it?” He stared wide-eyed at her.

She held the picture out to him in her shaking hand.

* * * *

Sam’s friends left, and finally the police. Anthony, according to Sam, had slipped out the back before the police arrived. He was rattled by June’s over-enthusiastic questioning and didn’t like commotion.

She went up to Sam’s room while he made sure all the doors and windows were locked. Dipity joined her in bed, crawling under the covers.

“We’ve both had a long day, huh?” June patted the lump beside her. “Lots of scary stuff.”

Sam came up and got in bed, laptop in hand. She cuddled against him, the picture tucked inside her shirt against her heart. She’d promised her mother she would Skype with her, but she couldn’t face her tonight. She wouldn’t be able to lie or avoid the topic of Jason. Instead she texted her, explaining it had been a long, tiring day and she would call her in the morning.

“They’re alive,” she said softly.

“Do you think it’s a recent picture?” Sam opened his laptop.

“They look dirty and pissed off. I’m guessing yes.” She paused. “He’s watching me. He was watching me at the press conference, and he’s watching me now. Hell, maybe he’s even still here.”

“I doubt he’s here right now, unless he’s hiding up in a tree like a fucking animal.”

She glanced at the windows. “I don’t think we need to go looking for him. I just have to call out when I’m ready to give an answer. If he wanted to send me a picture, though, he could have done it without the body. His idea of reassurance is horrifying.”

“You know Occam loves to horrify.” Sam clicked around on the laptop. “Anthony had information on Robbie. Something small, but it’s interesting.”

“Did he see him?”

“No, but he heard him. He spoke to the spies. Took them off guard, which he was hoping for. Immediately after Anthony left them, one of them called Robbie.”

“What did he say?”

“He seemed pleased Anthony was finally taking an interest in him. Then he told the guy on the phone to ‘get back here’ and said ‘we bypassed the secondary security system so you don’t have to sneak past the police.’”

June lifted her head. “What does that mean?”

“I don’t know. But it seems like he’s holed up somewhere that’s being guarded.”

“Why would he stay somewhere with police around? And that has a security system he needs to bypass?”

“Those are good questions. Hell, why would he even stay in Chicago? At this point, his safest bet would be to get the hell out of the city, get away from the legions of people searching for him.”

She dropped her head back down. “If he did that, he’d have to abandon his insane plan, not to mention his vampire friends he’s sure he can convince to give him eternal life.”

“Chicago isn’t the only place with vampires. I’m worried if he doesn’t get what he’s seeking here, he’ll go somewhere else and find a vampire that will bend to his whims. And then he’ll swoop back into Chicago, horrifying and invincible….” A hollow chill filled his voice as he trailed off.

She took her hand off the picture and slid her arm around his stomach.

“Maybe he’ll die,” she said softly. “Maybe the thing inside him will kill him.”

“What about his followers? They’ll carry on his legacy. His evil won’t die with him.”

“Maybe they’d lose focus without him.”

Sam didn’t say anything. She narrowed her eyes at his laptop screen.

“What are you looking at?” she asked.

“It’s Anthony’s blog. I’m seeing if anything sends up a red flag.”

“What does he blog about?”

“Most of it seems to be about the paranormal. A lot of navel-gazing and opinion. He doesn’t mention his own powers. He was probably afraid the Institute would throw a bag over his head and drag him back to their labs.”

The blog posts Sam scrolled through were long and dense. “He sure spends a lot of time on there,” she said.

“The Internet is his only friend, I’m sure. He’s got a lot of comments, though.”

“Maybe I should start reading his blog too. I bet he’s not as fun as the CIA guy.”

“I’ll be very careful when communicating with him. And I’ll keep doing my research.” He huffed. “By the way, the bloggers are talking about our love affair as well.”

“I know. We’re the talk of the town.”

“It’s thrilling.”

“It’s horrible.”

“You’re no fun.” He continued scrolling.

She looked across the room, toward the dresser. She tried not to think about the heartless vampire in the front yard, or anything else horrible, like her brother and Diego ending up heartless. Or Occam sitting on her chest in the middle of the night. Or Micha, dying in a hospital bed.

Micha.

“That’s your brother in those pictures over there?” she asked.

Sam draped an arm around her. “Yes. Lots of parties and awards dinners.”

“I’ve seen your brother before.”

He stroked his fingers through her hair. “Oh?” He didn’t sound surprised.

“Yes, the night we met Occam in the restaurant, when he took Micha to the clinic. You disguised Micha as your brother.”

“Very observant.”

She moved her head to his shoulder and looked up at him. He stared at the screen.

“Is it easier to disguise people by making them look like someone you know?”

He shrugged. “Sometimes. It requires the same amount of concentration and energy to maintain it.”

“Did Micha know you were disguising him as your brother?”

“No, and you didn’t, either, until now.”

“Was it supposed to be a secret?”

He looked down at her, his face unreadable. “No.”

“What was he like?” She plucked at Sam’s shirt. “You said he was into politics too. I don’t know anything else about him, except he was Kevin’s best friend. Was he involved in the Paranormal Alliance?”

“No, not hardly.”

“Why?”

“He didn’t like that sort of thing. He thought I was being arrogant. He thought creating an organization like that and openly hating the Institute would bring more violence and discrimination to our kind. He thought I would do more harm than good.”

She continued playing with his shirt, twisting and tugging at it. “Was he a shapeshifter too?”

“No, a telepath. But he tried to suppress it. It was never very strong, according to him.”

“So he wanted to be normal? And he wanted you to sit down and shut up about it?”

“More or less.”

“That must have made things difficult between you.” She tried to imagine Jason loving what he was and embracing it and crusading. She’d probably recoil like Sam’s brother and tell him to knock it off too.

“We had our differences,” Sam said. “As we got older, we didn’t see eye-to-eye on many things. He also hated that I was besmirching his good name in politics by using my own political clout to harp on paranormal issues. I think sometimes he wished he could disconnect from me altogether.”

“That sucks,” she said softly. “I mean, like it or not, you guys were still in the same boat.”

“Maybe he was right. Look what happened to my people. Look how many of them were hurt and killed by Robbie. Look how many went to his side because I wasn’t doing enough.”

“Stop it.” She pressed her hand to his chest. “We’ve been over this a million times. You’re not responsible for what Robbie did.”

“Yet, it happened, like Thomas predicted. I created the Paranormal Alliance. I was the impetus for all this. I brought unwanted attention and pain on our kind.”

“No, that was the Institute.”

“It’s hard to stand up for something, even something you believe in, when people are shouting you down and threatening you. I wanted to be brave. I wanted to be some kind of hero. That was selfish of me. It never should have been about me and what I wanted.”

She propped herself up on her elbow. “Sam. Everyone needs a hero. If you hadn’t been brave these past few months, none of us would have survived.”

He scoffed. “You’re quite brave on your own.”

“Yes, but being brave doesn’t always mean you know what to do. You have guts and smarts.”

He shook his head.

“Your brother was afraid. Like I was afraid. Remember when you first met me, how I wanted to deny what I was? To hide it? That’s because I was afraid of it. I’m still afraid of it.”

“I guess my brother had a good reason to be afraid. He certainly paid for my sins.”

“You didn’t kill your brother.” She sat up.

He gazed at her. His eyes were dark and glittering.

She lifted her arm and bent it, showing him the tattoo of the little girl. “You know who this is? It’s my little sister, Katie.”

Sam narrowed his eyes at the portrait.

“Jason accidentally caused her death when we were kids, with his power. It was a dumb, childish accident.”

Sam’s face softened. “I didn’t know that. I didn’t know you had a sister.”

She lowered her arm. “I don’t tell a lot of people, because he still feels guilty about it and blames himself. He didn’t know what he was doing. He was a kid, a kid who didn’t understand what he was and what he was capable of. Jason didn’t kill her. Circumstances beyond his control killed her.”

Sam was silent.

“And circumstances beyond your control killed your brother. Terrible people killed your brother.”

Dipity stirred under the covers. June tried to keep her voice down.

“Terrible people killed your friends in the park that day. I can say my choices led to my brother being held hostage, both at the Institute and by Occam. Micha can say his choices led to him being used as a guinea pig. None of that is true. Things happen, and they happen because of the two A’s: accidents or assholes. We’re the victims of our circumstances. You wouldn’t let me blame myself for everything, so why should I let you?”

“No,” he said. “And you’re right. We can’t blame ourselves. But that doesn’t mean we don’t regret the things we did that played a part in our circumstances.”

“You once told me regret is a useless emotion. You can mourn, but don’t regret. I’m sorry assholes took your brother from you. Even if you two didn’t get along, maybe someday you could have, if they hadn’t taken that opportunity away from you.”